Gang!
A big SORRY goes to all of you Illustrator fans. Why? You know why! Because it’s been too long since I posted a Illustrator freebie on my blog.
Anyways, this day has come and today I am proud and happy to offer you my latest creation Adobe Illustrator Christmas & New Year Symbols set. These symbols are compatibile with: Adobe Illustrator CS, CS2, CS3, CS4 and CS5.
This is what the symbols you are about to download look like:
Then, here is a short video on how to use Illustrator symbols:
Here is the download link:
[ DOWNLOAD ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR CHRISTMAS SYMBOLS --> ]
Sorry, 5 days subscription free download offer expired. However, you can still get those! Join GBG and enjoy this free Photoshop brushes set + more than 1500 other free downloads. Please read about our free download policy and join our GBG for more free downloads. Thanks!
And here is the message from our sponsor (and that would be me) and a great discount too:
(I’ve said so much about this set in my previous posts that all know what a great deal this is set is!)
Now, what else is going on?
Very IMPORTANT (even if it is at the end of the post it is still very important:
Don’t forget – our Christmas Graphics Contest is still open!
So, if you have a good Christmas graphics idea – don’t just let it hang out in your head doing nothing!
Put it on your digital canvas and send it over! Or even if you think that your idea is not so good – send it anyway. I bet it’s good!
Also, you just might be the lucky winner of our brand new product – Video Photo Album!
And even if you don’t win, you still won! You won the fun of creating graphics (and that’s what we’re here for in’nit?) and you won the attention and the hearts of thousands of visitors of our Facebook fan page and this blog who will enjoy your work!
P.S.:
Christmas & New Year Card Design Template created with these Illustrator symbols is available for download at my blogffiliate.com (dimensions are 5×7 inches at 300 dpi – print ready) –> DOWNLOAD HERE
Popularity: 8% [?]
OK. As I promised in my previous post, today I will show you how to display your work on Zazzle and give yourself a chance to sell some of your work done with my Photoshop brushes.
So, dimensions of our Christmas Party Invitation were 5.25” x 5.25” which is 2550 x 2550 pixels. It is important to start the document in proper dimensions. If we don’t do that – later on the things might get complicated.
Here are some explanations that you know before starting your own designs (explanation from Zazzle):
“Bleed” is a printing term used to indicate the area that will be trimmed off after the job is printed and cut down to the finished size. This ensures that the design is printed to the full edge of the product. Our paper products contain a Safe Area and a Bleed Area. Always make sure any important parts of your design fall inside the Safe Area, and that your design background fully extends through the Bleed Area. Whatever is in the Bleed Area will get trimmed off, leaving your design printed all the way up to the Product Edge.
Zazzle supports images in JPEG, PNG, PDF, and Adobe Illustrator (AI) formats – so, if you are working with transparent images PNG, PDF i AI formats will be the formats of your choice.
So, let’s roll the sleeves and start having fun! :)
Once you start a new project on Zazzle you will be offered several templates to start with.
A well done wizard will guide you through the creating process:
Pick the invitation size:
And add images. Basically, images are front and back size of our invitation in .jpg format.
So, let’s select “My computer” option …
And upload our invitation.
Not much to do from this point on. Here is the preview of the front side:
Now, let’s pick the back side:
And add the back side of our invitation:
Voila!
Now it is only a matter of posting our invitation in our store and making it available for purchase:
Of course, we will need to add some details to to, like entering a Title, Subtitle and the Description of our product:
That’s it! We’re done! Time for a cup of tea … or coffee!
Or, even better – make another product! Make a mug, or T-Shirt, or baseball hat, badge …. etc … etc …
It was pretty simple and fast – you will agree! I hope you like the idea and I hope you see, once again, on this example, how Photoshop brushes can be of a great help when it comes to speeding things up or bridging the creativity gaps we all run into from time to time.
OK. That’s it for today. Have a great weekend and have fun creating!
Hugs,
Silvia
Popularity: 1% [?]
Create unique Christmas Party Invitations for your friends and family or start a new job and earn some extra money. Here goes another short tutorial where I’m trying to prove, one more time, how easy, fast and fun it can be to use Photoshop brushes.
I this little tutorial I will show you how to use your passion and love for visual arts, turn your creative juices into something new and surprise your friends and/or family. In part two of this tutorial I will show you how to upload your Christmas Party Invitation to Zazzle and try to make some extra $$ with it!
And it will be fun!
So, for starters, let’s what we’ll need. Uhmmm … first we will need some nice, fancy-schmancy holiday font. You might have some already, but I always like to explore new stuff and I just ain’t gonna miss the opportunity to visit my favorite fonts places: www.dafont.com.
For this little occasion of ours - I picked this Santa’s Sleigh typography.
After downloading and installing the font (I hope you know how to do that, if not here is the hint: put them into Fonts folder :), we are going to open our good old Photoshop and create 5,25″x5,25″ document at 300 dpi. These dimensions (especially the dpi) are required by zazzle.com, so we’ll stick to it.
In this case I will load my favorite Christmas Photoshop Brushes set (55 brushes) (available in my shop for only $9,99), or you can use FREE LITE version (7 brushes) from GBG download area.If you are a GBG member you already have the download link and if you’re not – now here is a great opportunity! Become a GBG member and get access to 80+ Photoshop brushes sets including the FREE LITE Christmas Photoshop brushes set and FREE LITE Snowflakes Photoshop brushes set!
Press F5 to display Photoshop brushes window, load them and press B to activate Brush tool.
Because our Christmas Party Invitation has front and back side, we are going to organize our work in two Layer Groups, first Layer Group will be used for the front side of the invitation and the second Layer Group (which we will create on a later stage) will be used for the back side.
Now, let’s use some brushes! Press B to activate Brush tool, set foreground color to some light gray and simply add the brushes to our canvas.
Now, let’s add some snow!
Let’s add a new Layer (we are going to need it later) pick the snowflake brush and bit lighter gray color. Play with the brush settings as demonstrated below: adjust Shape Dynamics, Scattering for dispersion and Other Dynamics for the various tones of gray color and Spacing to adjust space between the snowflakes.
Now, just a few strokes with our brush on the canvas and voila! It’s snowing!
Now add desired text using Santa’s Sleigh font (downloaded from www.dafont.com).
And the front side of our invitation is over!
Now, let’s do some work on the back of the invitation. Create a new Layer Group and duplicate the layer with the snowflakes only.
On the back of the invitation type RSVP and make a dashed line with the Text tool (T). Spacing between the characters should be set at 100 (or more).
We are done :) Now print this card on your printer or use your local printing company or create account on zazzle.com.
That was simple, easy and fast, wasn’t it!
In the next tutorial I will show you how to make this invitation available for sale.
Whatever you do, do not forget: Have Fun Creating!
S :)
PS:
Of course, if you don’t feel like doing the whole thing by yourself, just DOWNLOAD this Christmas Party Invitation template in psd format HERE –>>
Sorry, 5 days subscription free download offer expired. Download is now available after joining GBG. Please read about our free download policy and join our GBG for more free downloads. Thanks!
Note: Santa’s Sleigh font is not included in the download (you will have to download it from www.dafont.com!)
And yes, you can sell stuff that you created with my Photoshop brushes! That’s because all of my Photoshop brushes come with a CU which stands for Commercial Use License, meaning you can create stuff with my brushes and sell it. So, get more great brushes from my Photoshop brushes shop and start creating ->
Orrrr … you can get all of my Photoshop brushes for 1/2 price! Find out more ->
Popularity: 5% [?]
Two weeks ago, I had this idea to create a unique envelope for my sisters-in-law birthday. But, in the meantime, she left for vacation and now she’s enjoying Californian hotels :)
So, I still have a chance to make a unique envelope for her birthday and it will wait for her when she’s back!
So, you guessed, today’s “download and print” freebie is - envelope template.
The original size of this envelope template is 8″x5″ on the 12″x12″ paper size, but you can print it on any size (like I did) just use “fit to paper” option on your Print window. For this envelope design I used Swirled Floral Photoshop Edges Brushes set and Floral Shapes Photoshop Brushes set. Both available in our little shop.
Now, take a look at my short photo story on how to make an envelope. It’s fun and easy so, enjoy!
1. Print the envelope template and cut out the envelope shape. I used fancy-edge scissors just to cover my possible cutting mistakes :)
2. Fold the paper carefully and try to match (as much as you can) the illustrations on the bottom flap and top flap of the envelope. Apply 1/4″ wide double-sided tape along the side edges of the back, starting below the curves.
3. That’s it! This is the Back side of the envelope. The flaps are designed to match one another!
4. And the front side of the envelope with the place where you can write your loved one name :)
Download this envelope template design here, buy Swirled Floral Edges Photoshop Brushes set or buy Floral Shapes Photoshop Brushes set and the most important thing: have fun creating!
Silvia
P.S.
And if you are looking for the ULTIMATE solution to your graphic design and similar headaches check out the one and only 800+ Photoshop brushes MEGA SET ->
Popularity: 3% [?]
Guys,
This the last day of the Competition. If you still did not submit your work – now is your chance.
I wish the best of luck to all of you.
And here is a little something I just did for those of you who love photography. I shot this image a few years ago, there was this beautiful olive tree plantation and the clouds were just magical. The shot was taken in Istria/Croatia and I must add that this area offers loads of opportunities for photographers and people who like photography.
After I did a little “touch up” in Photoshop (wanted to emphasize the oldness of the tree and the magic of the surroundings) I placed the photo on one of the background from 2 Pack Graphics: Old Grunge Paper images 3. This was done using layer multiply effect.
I placed the whole thing on the paper that I did for this purpose (plain brown background with texturizer filter applied).
The cornders come from Photo Corners (20+20) Photoshop brushes.
So, basically, to get an effect like this is more simple than it looks, isn’t it?
So, I hope you like it. Feel free to browse through my little shop for some other HiRes Photoshop brushes, background images and vectors.
Love ya all,
Silvia
Popularity: 1% [?]
Somebody asked me, a while ago, if I could make a tutorial on how to create this kind a special (old skin) effect on a photo.
So here it is, Sanya portrait from last Thursday’s TT post in original RGB colors and combined with the dirt texture in sepia tone.
A word from our sponsor (that would be me :):
800+Photoshop Brushes MEGA SET is the prefect choice for all of you who’s business or passion has anything to do graphics. Find out more about 800+Photoshop Brushes MEGA SET by Graphics-Illustrations.Com.
This video tutorial is really huge so I had to cut it out to four parts:
- 1. First part is about Desaturating RGB photo and coloring it to sepia tone. Easy way :)
- 2. Second video is about applying texture brush to the image.
- 3. Third video is about using mask on layer in Photoshop, this is the longest one (and the heaviest: 33MB)
- 4. And the last one, fourth video is about softening layer with the texture just to add more natural look to the image
That’s it :D
If you followed that tutorial on your computer – you learned something new today!
If not, go back, start Photoshop and follow the steps from this tutorial.
Have fun creating!
S
A word from our sponsor (that would be me :):
800+Photoshop Brushes MEGA SET is the prefect choice for all of you who’s business or passion has anything to do graphics. Find out more about 800+Photoshop Brushes MEGA SET by Graphics-Illustrations.Com.
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OK. St. Patrick’s Day is coming and I though I’d prepare something original for the occasion.
St. Patricks Day apron. I mean, everybody’s got a T-shirt already, inn’it?
Apron for St. Patrick’s Day with Irish saying by “unnamed author”)
For every wound, a balm.
For every sorrow, cheer.
For every storm, a calm.
For every thirst, a beer.
So, here is a short “How-to” make something like this on Zazzle.
1. STEP ONE
In Photoshop, create a document 7×8 inch on 200 dpi (you could do it on 300dpi just to be on the safe side when it comes to quality, but 200dpi will work fine as well):
2. STEP TWO
Now select a color by clicking on a “Foreground color” in PS main toolbar. In my case that was #107208 in hexadecimal (that’s R: 16, G: 114, B:8 in RGB color system)
3. STEP THREE
Load the brushes set (if you need more help on how to load brushes in Photoshop please visit “How to Install and Use Brushes in Photoshop“), select the brush you want and place it on the document :). Add some text (like the one at the beginning of this post) and save it as JPG at max quality (12).
Now you can upload this JPG to zazzle and apply it on t-shirts, mugs, bags… apron! Zazzle will do the rest of the work for you.
Just remember: have fun! Always! Simply because life is pointless without having a fun!
XOXO,
Silvia
Popularity: 1% [?]
Hi Gang,
Many of you asked me about coloring brushes in Adobe Illustrator.
Well, I know, I promised to make a video tutorial long time ago, but there is so much to do and so little time :)
Anyways, finally, it is here. Video tutorial on coloring the brushes.
Before watching it, please make sure that you have your Illustrator ready and the brushes window open (F5).
Basically, what I’m doing here is the following:
- First I load my Adobe Illustrator brushes from Vector Floral Shapes set (30). As soon as the desired brush is clicked on – it appears on the brushes window.
- Double click on the brush to open a dialog box. “Colorization method” has to be set to “Tints”.
- Rest is self explanatory, just make the shape and select the color with the color picker
Enjoy the movie and let me know if you think I should add more details.
Have fun creating!
Silvia
P.S.
Of course, even if you are not interested in getting 800+ HiRes Pro Photoshop brushes for 1/2 the price (which is barely possible); you certainly don’t want to miss the Vectors and Illustrations department in my little shop :)
Popularity: 1% [?]
Gang!
Since I know many of you are, one way or another, involved into weddings whether it be as a friends, family or wedding photographers it is always nice to have some cool photos from the occasion. So, I thought I’d show you how to decorate a wedding photo with Photoshop brushes.
In this particular example we used two different brushes from two different brushes sets:
Here is the final outcome:
And here is how we got there.
1. Load a plain photo in Photoshop
2. Load first brushes set, in this case Swirls 2, Photoshop brushes set, 36
(Click here if you need to find out how to load and use brushes into Photoshop->)
2. Place the first brush on the photo like this:
3. Load second brushes set, in this case Photoshop Brushes – Floral Shapes (37)
4. Place that second brush it on the top of the first one so that it creates one new shape
(Find out how to color the brush ->)
5. Now, the time has come to color the right part of the image. First we need to make a selection, to do that – use Polygonal Lasso Tool (L)
6. Close the path: join beginning and the ending points
7. Click on Gradient Tool (G). Now click and on the gradient itself (upper left corner) and adjust the colors until you get something like this (or whatever look you prefer)
8. Drag the gradient with the mouse from upper left corner to the bottom right corner
9. Add some drop shadow on the first brush to enhance the visual effect. Double click on the layer thumbnail to get the “Layer style Pop-Up window”, checkmark the Drop Shadow box.
10. Adjust the drop shadow settings like this
And voila!
Add text and here is our newly decorated wedding photo!
I hope you liked it! I tried to make it as simple as possible but if there are some steps that are not completely clear please let me know.
Love,
Silvia
P.S.
Of course, don’t forget to browse through my little shop for some cool brushes and stuff :)
Popularity: 3% [?]
OK Gang!
First, I need to apologize for not writing for so long. Mea culpa. Was away for a while.
So, for those of you who wanted to find out was the graphic from the previous post done – here it is.
OK. But, first, let me show you another version of the same graphic (one layer is switched off and it became even more interesting – I think).
OK. And here is what it looks like in Photoshop:
So, let’s go layer by layer starting from the bottom.
- White background (it’s kinda obvious but I need to be consistent :)
- Layer with the brush, filled and outlined, stroke, 3px. You can choose colors as you feel fit. The same one is copied and placed on the top – point No. 5
- Black&White version of the photo
- Color version of the photo, cut-out in the shape of the brush. How it’s done? Easy a) select the layer with the full image b) Hold down the Ctrl key and click on the layer with the brush, brush shaped selection will load it self onto photo c) Press Ctrl+Shift+I to invert the selectio d) Press Delete to delete the selectio. That’s how I got this layer
- Copy of layer 8, Layer blending mode – Screen (for all other Layers it’s Normal)
And that’s it!
Let me know if point 4 was not explained very well. I will make a video about it.
Don’t forget! This great brush is a part of even greater package called Ultimate Wedding Photography PS Brushes Pack (158) which is on sale now, 158 HiRes Commercial free PC/Mac Photoshop brushes, find out more here ->
Love,
Silvia
Popularity: 2% [?]
Now, that was supposed to be a catchy headline. I hope it was catchy enough to get you start reading this. If you are a beginner willing to learn about Adobe Illustrator, this short video might be kinda revealing for you.
So, as always in my video tutorials, make sure your Adobe Illustrator is open and your mouse is always close to “Pause” button on the video as you’ll have to press “Pause” a lot and do what I do on your screen simultaneously.
Ok. I this is probably the fastest possible way to make a flower in Illustrator enthusiasts. So, 2 minutes and 36 seconds tutorial for a flower is, IMHO – not bad.
Captions on the bottom of the video should give you all additional info on what’s being done.
Use shortcuts whenever it is possible! This is very important! It will speed you up tremendously. Keep your left hand fingers on:
- “V“, Selection tool, important when selecting objects for rotation and transformations and for moving objects
- “A“, Direct Selection tool, important for manipulation with points (in this tutorial to join endpoints and create a petal shape)
- “Alt (PC)”/”Option (Mac)” important when duplicating objects (in this tutorial when duplicating and rotating at the same time)
So, if you try and do your best to use the shortcuts and learn to work using shortcuts whenever it is possible it will really make your work in Illustrator (and any other software) much much faster and easier.
OK. Let’s get to work now. As I said, make sure your mouse always close to “Pause” button as you will need to Pause a lot.
Let me know what you think or if you have any questions!
Popularity: 6% [?]
Hello, hello!
OK, guys, I know that the first tutorial on creating swirls in AI was not the best tutorial on the topic and it just screamed for improvement.
So, we did some.
We did a video, accompanied with some fine ambient music
(thanks Rach!)
Please note, before starting the video and really learn how make a swirl in Adobe Illustrator you will need to:
- Open Adobe Illustrator
- Make sure that your mouse is always close to the “Pause” button.
- Click “Pause” after each action taken on the video.
- Do the same on your computer
Video is accompanied with titles explaining what has been done each step of the way.
This is the first part. In next part we will add a branch to the swirl. And we’ll see where to go from there.
I hope you’ll like it!
D.
P.S.
Popularity: 2% [?]
I received a lot of questions about using my Photoshop brushes in Photoshop Elements.
Here is a short video (129 seconds) to show you how to use my (and any other) Photoshop brushes in Photoshop Elements:
- Loading brushes
- Decorating a family photo
So, here is what’s going on on video:
- Select Brush tool (Shortcut “B”)
- Expand Brushes palette
- Go to “Load brushes”
- Browse to the directory with brushes and select “Swirls butterflies PREMIUM set” -> Load
- Select one of the brushes
- Make sure Hue Jitter is 100% (that is if you want color to vary)
- Adjust the size of each of the butterflies by pressing [ (to decrease) or ] (to increase)
- Place butterflies around the image
This is just a small intro to answer some of your questions related to compatibility of Photoshop brushes with Elements. This video was done in Elements 6.0
If you were just thinking about getting Photoshop Elements for PC:
Adobe Photoshop Elements for Windows
If you were just thinking about getting Photoshop Elements for Mac:
Adobe Photoshop Elements for Mac
If you would like to get great, big and huge discounts on my brushes Click here (time limited offer) ->
If you’re designer looking for more images like the one used in this video please refer to iStockphoto.
Love,
Silvia
P.S.
Eh, and don’t forget to check out my latest Photoshop brushes Catalog – Summer 2008 Edition ->
Popularity: 1% [?]
So, in last post we talked about Paint.NET and how to get Photoshop brushes into it.
Now, it’s only fair that we say a word or two about GIMP. Just like Paint.NET, GIMP is also free Image Manipulation Program. It was interesting to notice how Paint.NET had only 1.6Mb. That’s, like, really really small. GIMP seems to be a bit heavier – 17Mb.
So, let’s see what’s GIMP‘s functionality when it comes to brushes and how could we use existing Photoshop brushes in GIMP.
So, here is the procedure:
1. Convert Photoshop brush to .png
- Start abrViewer
- In abrViewer, click on load brushes and select the folder that contains .abr files (Photoshop Brushes)
- Double-Click on the brush set that you would like to convert
- Go to Export -> Thumbnails and select the location for .png files
2. Import that .png brush to GIMP
3. Go to File-> Save As -> <somename>.gbr
4. Make sure to save it into <GIMP installation folder>\share\gimp\2.0<version No.>\brushes
And Voila! You now have Photoshop brushes in GIMP!
OK. I made one GIMP brushes set for you. For free of course:
– download free version of Swirled Floral Edges GIMP brushes set (4 brushes) ->
There are four brushes here in this LITE version. If you are after creating your own designs or scrapbooking, or if you are a photographer looking to enrich your photos or photobooks you will surely want to get more of these. So for full PREMIUM version of (including commercial license) click here and be amazed on how cheap they come and how useful they are ->
Of course, to make the ultimate save for the ultimate brushes make sure to click on the banner on the right hand side (by the way, that’s my friend Mirta pointing with her finger :)) and see how you can get all of my ultimate edition brushes for 1/2 the price AND get ADDITIONAL $10 bonus (this $10 bonus is time limited offer so if you’re interested, now is the best time to buy)!
Anyways, that’s all for now, I hope you learned something new and I’m looking forward to see your works, so please, keep’ em coming! I’ll feature them on this blog.
Love,
Silvia
Popularity: 6% [?]
Paint.NET plugin and tutorial on how to use Photoshop brushes in paint.net. There are also some Paint.NET photoshop brushes included for free download.
Read More Post a comment (31)Gang! I wanted to show you a bit more of Illustrator Brushes potential. Here is a little demonstration on how simple it is to create amazing shapes with Illustrator Brushes.
The rest is up to your imagination :)
This video was created with one shape from Vector Floral Shapes Illustrator set (there are 30 of them in this package – click here for more info). You can make endless designs just by moving anchors and handles with “Direct Selection Tool” as shown in this video.
So, what I’m saying is: It’s really easy with the NEW …
- Vector Floral Shapes Illustrator Brushes set -
30 brand new Floral Shapes come in:
- 1. .ai (of course Adobe Illustrator brush, all CS versions)
- 2. .eps format
- 3. .cdr (Corel 8.0 up to X4)
- 4. .psd (Photoshop 7.0 up to CS3)
- 5. .png (so you can easily use them in any photo editing software)
- 6. .ai (Vector format for Adobe Illustrator 8 onwards)
Popularity: 1% [?]
Loading Brushes in Adobe Illustrator- Short Video Tutorial
And, here is what I did in this video:
1. Window -> Brushes (Could have acomplished the same thing with F5)
2. From Brushes Palette Menu I selected “Open brush library”
3. And, of course, selected Floral Shapes Brushes.
In my next tutorial I will demonstrate how much fun playing with Illustrator brushes can be :)
Stay Tuned :)
Floral Shapes Illustrator Brushes:
- for all your scrapbooking needs
- for web and print
- for your graphic design projects small and big ones
[BUY THESE AND BROWSE MANY MORE AT G-I SHOP]
Popularity: 2% [?]
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